12. Chapter 12
twelve
Jamie
M onday morning, I’m at the brewery before the sun even comes up. It’s brew day and I’ve never missed one, broken bones be damned. I check on the beers we have in the cellar, schedule deliveries for the rest of the week—all the things I can accomplish with my ass in a chair.
The guys who work for me have had to pick up a lot of slack since I can’t shovel grain or move kegs, and navigating the wet floors on an unstable knee is too risky even for me, so I DoorDash them some coffee and doughnuts as a thank you before I head over to the taproom to meet Wes.
By the time I pull into the parking lot, my entire body is aching, which has the inconvenient side effect of reminding me of Noel’s hands on me last night. Her fingers at the back of my neck.
I’ve forgotten what it feels like to be touched by a woman like that, soft and tender . Her pretty laugh chiming beside me while we sat shoulder to shoulder watching Little Miss Sunshine . I could still smell her perfume on my couch this morning.
It’s been years since I found myself replaying a night with a woman, and the realization jerks through me like a snap of fingers in front of my face.
I hold open the door with my crutch and struggle my way into the bar, making it halfway through before it slips and hits me in the ass.
Em busts out laughing. “Smooth like butter, Jameson.”
I give her the finger and pick the damn things up, limping the rest of the way to the bar without them. I only brought them because Noel told me I should. “Thanks for the help, dick. You laugh at old ladies trying to cross the street too?”
She presses a hand to her chest. “Never. But you looking anything but cool always makes my day a little brighter.”
I wink at her. “It’s so rare, I can see why.”
“Sure, J.”
“You’re late.” Wes emerges from the hall to his office, his expression a portrait of annoyance. I’m not in the habit of letting that bitchy tone slide from him, but I’m too exhausted to scrap with my brother right now. And I am actually almost fifteen minutes late.
“I forgot to set a reminder on my phone,” I tell him. A fatal mistake for my chaotic brain. Especially when all of my executive functioning is being used to manage multiple broken bones. “Sorry, man. Pain’s messing with my head.”
Wes is unmoved. “Here are the numbers for the launch.”
He tosses a spreadsheet on the bar in front of me and it lands in a drop of water, the top corner shriveling like my good mood. I wish he wouldn’t do this here. He has a fucking office with a door.
At least Em’s the only one here as I climb onto a stool and set my crutches against the bar, scooping up the paper.
Wes watches me read the columns, sorting the numbers slowly so they don’t evaporate into my brain.
I know he does this on purpose. He could bullet it for me, give me the info he knows I want, but he keeps control where he can. Always has.
When we were kids, it was trading chores in exchange for him doing my math homework so I wouldn’t get benched from hockey.
He’d make a point to keep my grade just barely passing.
If I’d come home with any higher, he reasoned, no one would buy it.
Now that we work together, it’s this shit. The little reminders of why I need him.
Focusing on the bolded numbers at the bottom, I note they’re all black, every single one, and this part I understand. “Looks like we live to see another day.”
Wes leans back on the stool and crosses his arms. “That was never in question. It’s how well we want to live that’s up for debate.”
“I think we have different ideas on what living well means, bro.” I fold the paper in half, tucking it in the pocket of my hoodie. I’ll go over the lines later when I can focus. “There’s something to be said for making a decent living while staying local, true to your roots.”
Wes rolls his eyes. “Stay broke for the pride of it all. How noble of you.”
“We’re hardly broke.”
“We could be a lot richer.”
“We don’t have to make Forbes to be successful, Wes. If we can maintain what we have, I’d call it a win.”
He huffs. “You would, Jameson.”
“What’s that mean?”
“It’s just telling where you place your bar for success is all.”
The throbbing in my head settles behind my eyes, and I press my palms there. There goes all of the relief I got from Noel last night. Didn’t I just say I wasn’t going to get into it with him ?
Em clears her throat. She plays the de facto referee between the two of us enough that she can sense we’ve turned an unpleasant corner. “Speaking of the launch, Jamie. The woman whose drinks you were buying that night—is she the Kelly rebound?”
Shit . If Em was trying to steer Wes and I away from an argument, bringing up Noel was a wrong turn. I haven’t told Wes that she’s back in town for a reason. He’s not going to like my plan to spend time with her in hopes of another tip, and I’m not going to like whatever he chooses to say about it.
“I don’t need to rebound from Kelly,” I say, hoping that will be the end of it.
Em’s smile tells me it’s not. “I haven’t seen this one before. She’s not one of your usual groupies.”
I frisbee-toss a cardboard coaster at her. “Her name’s Noel. She’s an… old friend.”
Wes’s eyebrows do a slow ascent to his hairline. Fucking Em . “I’m assuming this is the Noel I think it is.”
“One in the same,” I admit. I’ve smartened up in the last five minutes, though, so I’m not telling either of them that she was at my apartment last night, or that I’m seeing her later today.
“How did you get back in contact with her?” Wes asks.
The hazy, concussed memory of Noel staring down at my broken body comes back to me. The way I was sure I was dead. “Weird coincidence.”
Wes huffs a laugh that grates at me. “I suppose you still think she’s some magical angel from destiny land because she warned you about Becs.”
The careless way he says this hits my stomach like a punch.
That’s the thing about working with family, everything is personal even when it’s not.
Like a secret hand signal only we understand, Wes knows bringing up Becca is the quickest way to remind me of my biggest shortcoming—misreading a situation, getting important things really fucking wrong.
That’s why I can’t rest on the courage of my conviction about declining this offer from NEBev.
He’s reminding me that my conviction has a piss poor track record.
“Wait,” Em says, her eyes going wide. “That was the girl from the party? The psychic?”
I give her drop it eyes but she either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care. “All the times I’ve heard this story and you never mentioned she’s freaking gorgeous? No wonder you’ve been obsessed with her for two years.”
“I wasn’t obsessed with her,” I fire back.
Okay, maybe a little . Maybe I spent more time thinking about her than made sense, given the briefness of our first meeting, and maybe those thoughts weren’t always business related.
Em’s making it sound creepy, though. It’s not like I built a shrine to her in my loft, sacrificing shots of J?ger to summon her back.
I was just… intrigued. Who wouldn’t be in my position?
She gave me everything good that I have.
It would be impossible not to hold affection for her. That’s the extent of it.
Or it used to be. It was a lot easier to remind myself that I know better when she wasn’t right in front of me.
For a woman who boldly demanded a shot in exchange for a moment of her time, Noel’s adorably awkward—sitting all prim and proper at breakfast, fingers twisting in her skirt.
And last night, those apple-round cheeks with their easy blush that’s becoming my new favorite game, her bare thigh touching me every time she moved.
My daydreams about the girl from the roof and her pretty smile had nothing on the real thing.
I look up to see Em’s mouth curl up on one side, slowly like a cartoon villain.
“What?”
“Your face.”
“What about my face?”
“You’re sleeping with her. Damn, I thought sitting on a bar stool in your condition was a bad idea, but that has to be in the ‘no’ column in your discharge instructions.”
“I am not sleeping with her.” What the hell had my face been doing ? I gesture to my crutches to sell my story. Which is completely true and doesn’t need much selling. “I’m not really up to dating right now, Em.”
She gasps. “Jameson Bishop, think of your fans!”
“Knock it off.” I say it casually but it feels like there’s a spotlight suddenly shining on me.
“Whatever,” Em says. “You always get the cute ones first, Jamie. Maybe that bruise on your face will put us on an even playing field.”
“You wish,” I shoot back. “And it’s not like that.”
“Then what is it like, Jamie?” Wes asks. “I mean, you have enough friends to keep you company, so if you’re not trying to sleep with her…” His eyes narrow as if he’s reading something on my face. “Christ, you want her to do it again, don’t you?”
“It has nothing to do with that,” I snap, because lying to Wes is easier than winning an argument with him. We don’t see eye to eye on a lot, and choosing my battles is pretty key to our working relationship.
The only problem with that is I’m a shit liar, and Wes knows it. “Bull shit,” he says. “I know how much you believe all this nonsense. There’s no other reason she would be here.”
I turn on my stool and grab my crutches. “This really isn’t any of your business, Wes.”
That was the wrong choice of words. His nostrils flare like a bull. “I think it is my business if it has to do with this business. Do you remember what my dad told you when he picked you up from County that night, Jamie?”
I hate when Wes brings up that night like it’s some pivotal moment from a TV drama.
The screw-up gets scared straight. For the record, Wes was at that party too.
It was sheer luck he ditched out before it got busted up.
I’ve never seen anyone so relieved as Wes’s dad when he got downtown and found out it was just “Laura’s boy” sitting in a cement cell, not his real son.
“I remember that night well,” I say. “Thanks.”
He continues anyway. “He said if you’ve always got your head in the clouds, you’re bound to step in some shit. It’s time to be a grown up, Jamie. We don’t make business decisions this way anymore. Not while I’m around.” With that, he spins on his heel and takes off for his office.
At least this time there’s no confusing things. I’ve definitely just made things worse.